Lawyers of car crash victim ask to stop criminal prosecution

The road accident occurred in Leninsky Prospekt on February 25, 2010

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MOSCOW, October 16 (Itar-Tass) — The lawyers of the family of Olga Alexandrina, who was killed in a car crash in Moscow's Leninsky Prospect, lodged a petition to stop her criminal prosecution because of a lack of corpus delicti in her actions.

The Citroen's driver and her passenger - Prof. Vera Sidelnikova - were killed in the crash. They worked in the Kulakov obstetrics research centre. They were driving to work, when the road accident occurred. The Investigative Committee later closed the probe saying Alexandrina had caused the crash. The probe was dropped due to the death of the injured partly.

"The reading of the Leninsky Prospekt car crash case is finished. The lawyers lodged a petition asking to stop the criminal prosecution of Olga Alexandrina on the grounds that there is no corpus delicti in her actions," according to the report placed on the website of lawyers Igor Trunov and Lyudmila Aivar.

The lawyers said Alexandrina's guilt had not been proven. "On the contrary, it is in the actions by the Mercedes driver that signs of traffic rules violations are found, which resulted in the road accident and the death of Alexandrina and Sidelnikova," they said.

The lawyers also asked for additional investigation to ascertain the culprits behind the car crash. "The preliminary investigation bodies have not carried out a probe into the case properly; the evidence in favor of Alexandrina is illegally and unjustifiably rejected or destroyed /maliciously or otherwise is a matter of separate check/. The charges are based on contradicting and inconsistent evidence with which the investigators are trying to protect the true culprit from justice, and deprive the real victims - Aelxandrina and Sidelnikova - of the right to defense and reimbursement of damage," the lawyers said.

Earlier, the Constitutional Court met the action by Alexandrina's family. It said the norms of the criminal procedure code that allow for dropping criminal prosecution in connection with the suspect’s death without the consent of her close relatives insisting on rehabilitation of the diseased person did not conform to the Constitution. The court ordered the relevant amendments to the criminal procedure code.

After this ruling, the lawyers of Alexandrina's father asked the investigator to resume the probe.